Monday, 21. November 2005

"Most of the high-profile AJAX web applications are commercial and run on corporate servers like Google Maps or Flickr.
We're going to start with some lesser-know solutions that are Open Source, and can be hosted on your own PHP/MySQL
enabled server. Since we're diving into a new subject, I'm going to take a couple lines in explanation. AJAX or
Asynchronous JavaScript and XML is a programming method that allows interactive interfaces in web applications. What?
You can now drag-and drop and change options without reloading a webpage. This week's picks are great examples of
this technology that enhance your web experience and replace some of your desktop applications. "

Thursday, 27. October 2005

"A new PHP based Ajax framework put its hat in the ring: PAJAJ.PAJAJ is a object oriented Ajax framework, created
by Gilbert Hyatt, written in PHP5 for development of event driven PHP web applications. The framework follows 5 basic
principles: Simplicity: Everything can be done in PHP. Various development models: Developer develops
the whole application and interface in PHP Designer generate a pretty but dump page, and you then hook events to
it to make it a real application You design an interface as a template (example Smarty), and have the framework
make html, CSS, Javascript that you pore into the template Event Driven Late Binding of Events: no changes
need to be made to the HTML themselves Object Oriented: There are not only objects for the Ajax plumbing, but for
page elements that you are interacting with "

Tuesday, 25. October 2005

"MochiKit makes JavaScript suck lessMochiKit is a highly documented and well tested, suite of JavaScript libraries
that will help you get shit done, fast. We took all the good ideas we could find from our Python, Objective-C, etc.
experience and adapted it to the crazy world of JavaScript. "

I find a lot of this AJAX stuff a bit of a hype. Lots of people have
been using similar things long before it became "AJAX". And it really
isn't as complicated as a lot of people make it out to be. Here is a
simple example from one of my apps. First the Javascript:

This creates a request object along with a send request and handle
response function. So to actually use it, you could include this js in
your page. Then to make one of these backend requests you would tie it
to something. Like an onclick event or a straight href like this:

Now, look at handleResponse. It parses the "foo|foo done" string and
splits it on the '|' and uses whatever is before the '|' as the dom
element id in your page and the part after as the new innerHTML of that
element. That means if you have a div tag like this in your page:

Once you click on that link, that will dynamically be changed to:

foo done

That's all there is to it. Everything else is just building on top of
this. Replacing my simple response "id|text" syntax with a richer XML
format and makine the request much more complicated as well. Before you
blindly install large "AJAX" libraries, have a go at rolling your own
functionality so you know exactly how it works and you only make it as
complicated as you need. Often you don't need much more than what I
have shown here.

Expanding this approach a bit to send multiple parameters in the
request, for example, would be really simple. Something like:

"The Really Simple History (RSH) framework makes it easy for AJAX applications to incorporate bookmarking and back and
button support. By default, AJAX systems are not bookmarkable, nor can they recover from the user pressing the browser's
back and forward buttons. The RSH library makes it possible to handle both cases.
In addition, RSH provides a framework to cache transient session information that persists after a user leaves the web
page. This cache is used by the RSH framework to help with history issues, but can also be used by your own applications
to improve application performance. The cache is linked to a single instance of the web page, and will disappear when
the user closes their browser or clear their browser's cache.
RSH works on Internet Explorer 6+ and Gecko-based browsers, like Firefox. Safari is not supported." - AJAX Anwendung
Bookmark-kompatibel machen

"The AJAX MAssive Storage System (AMASS) uses a hidden flash applet to allow JavaScript AJAX applications to store an
arbitrary amount of sophisticated information on the client side. This information is permanent and persistent; if a
user closes their browser or navigates away from the web site, the information is still present and can be retrieved
later by the web page. Information stored by web pages is private and locked to a single domain, so other web sites can
not access this information.AMASS makes it possible to store an arbitrary amount of sophisticated data, way pass
the 4K limit of cookies or the 64K limit of Internet Explorer's proprietary client-side storage system. An AMASS-enabled
web site can store up to 100K without user permission. After 100K, users are prompted on whether the web site can store
the requested amount of information. Users can approve or deny the storage request. The AMASS system informs the
client-side application on whether the storage request was allowed or denied. In my own testing I have been able to
store up to ten megabytes with good performance; I'm sure even more information can be stored, I just have never tried
beyond this amount.AMASS works on Internet Explorer 6+ and Gecko-based browsers, like Firefox. Users must have the
Flash plugin version 6+ installed to use AMASS; Flash 6+ is installed in 95% of machines, however." - Kleiner Trick
wenn mal mehr Daten auf Client-Seite gespeichert werden müssen. Das sollte aber soweit es geht vermieden
werden...

Monday, 17. October 2005

"Ajax Pages is a scripting template engine that enables rapid development of Ajax Web-based Applications, just like
GMail, Google Maps, A9 and Backpack, but without having to manipulate complicated Document Object Models to make things
dynamic."

Sunday, 16. October 2005

"Dojo is an Open Source toolkit that allows you to easily build dynamic capabilities into web pages and any other
environment that supports JavaScript. Dojo provides components that let you make your sites more useable, responsive,
and functional. With Dojo you can build degradeable user interfaces more easily, prototype interactive widgets quickly,
animate transitions, and build AJAX-based requests simply. Dojo layers these capabilities onto a lightweight packaging
system which forms the core of Dojo. When you write scripts with Dojo, you can include as few or as many of the
available APIs as you need, and your app will only include what it uses."